Ah! It’s good to be back “home” online… to feel free (safe) again – to write, report equality news, express, vent and connect with the online community.

Thanks to the guardian!

I was sidelined by trolls (one, two and three) at WordPress in 2010 & tried to blog occasionally from Blogger, hoping to avoid trolls. By 2012 my blogging expressions had eventually slowed to a halt.

There are guardians everywhere around us… let us tune our spirits to “see,” and purpose in our souls to be the same protectors to the vulnerable amongst us all.

For example, there are a world of transgender teens all around us who have been marginalized, rejected, threatened, misunderstood. With the newest news coverage of Caitlyn Jenner and the very public transition journey from born a male Olympian, to becoming a very public re-born female trailblazer.

After Wednesdays landmark decision to overturn Prop. 8(California’s ban on same-sex marriage), several news shows highlighted coverage of the legal victory in the Prop. 8 case, and discussed the important move toward full marriage equality in America.

On MSNBC that night, Keith Olbermann replayed his special comment from 11/10/2008 — after Prop. 8 had won that night via “popular vote.” This may be one of the best rebuttals to the “re-defining marriage” mantra.

I keep hearing this term “re-defining” marriage. If this country hadn’t re-defined marriage, black people still couldn’t marry white people. Sixteen states had laws on the books which made that illegal in 1967. 1967.

The parents of the President-Elect of the United States couldn’t have married in nearly one third of the states of the country their son grew up to lead. But it’s worse than that. If this country had not “re-defined” marriage, some black people still couldn’t marry black people. It is one of the most overlooked and cruelest parts of our sad story of slavery. Marriages were not legally recognized, if the people were slaves. Since slaves were property, they could not legally be husband and wife, or mother and child. Their marriage vows were different: not “Until Death, Do You Part,” but “Until Death or Distance, Do You Part.” Marriages among slaves were not legally recognized.

You know, just like marriages today in California are not legally recognized, if the people are gay.

…

What is this, to you? Nobody is asking you to embrace their expression of love. But don’t you, as human beings, have to embrace… that love? The world is barren enough.

It is stacked against love, and against hope, and against those very few and precious emotions that enable us to go forward. Your marriage only stands a 50-50 chance of lasting, no matter how much you feel and how hard you work.

And here are people overjoyed at the prospect of just that chance, and that work, just for the hope of having that feeling. With so much hate in the world, with so much meaningless division, and people pitted against people for no good reason, this is what your religion tells you to do? With your experience of life and this world and all its sadnesses, this is what your conscience tells you to do?

And Time did tell! Evidently a twenty-five year study shows kids of lesbian couples are the recipients of a great parenting environment in which to be nurtured and reared.

There are many struggles that gay and lesbian families cope with on a regular basis. Such as: not being acknowledged in their communities as “real” families, constant barrage of persecution from ex’s or other family and friends who come to the table with their own acrimony, compounded by the lack of family and relationship protections (“rights”) in our country for non-traditional families — these are just some of the challenges. Granted, all families have challenges! Whether they are comprised of “nuclear” or blended, or LGBT members… safely guiding children to adulthood is not for the faint of heart!

It is nice to get a little good news like this from the “mainstream media” in times like these — in the midst of the tornado that is life lately. No matter how many longitudinal studies there are, there will always be detractors. But for today, it’s nice to have some sort of good news along the long, weary, bumpy journey.

Well, President Obama recently made good on a promise to the LGBT community. Did he repeal D.A.D.T.? No. Did he repeal D.O.M.A.? No. What did he do?

He ordered hospital visitation rights for gay and lesbian couples. When did he pledge to grant this “right”? Well, it may have been more than one instance, but I remember it from Brian Williams’ interview with Obama on NBC tonight “Inside the White House.” That was the interview where the President skirted around what issues he would take up for LGBT Americans and offered the carrot of being able to visit their partner in the hospital.

I’m not sure I had ever given that “right” much thought until I had seen the movie “If These Walls Could Talk 2.” Near the end of the first vignette one partner has taken her partner to the hospital. She waits quite a while–having heard no news–then asks to see her “friend.” The nurse tells her that “only family members are allowed.” She tells the nurse she is going to stay right there in the waiting room, and asks the staff to let her know if anything changes in the condition of her “friend.” I’ll let you watch the clip from the movie to see what happens the next morning.

Suffice it to say, I see theimmeasurable valueof being allowed to visit one’s partner in the hospital–and I am grateful our President has taken this step. However, experience has shown that this “order” alone is not enough. In Oregon when the governor made domestic partnerships law including all the “rights afforded to marriage,” gay and lesbian couples found that they still had to prove their connection when trying to see their partner at the hospital. Can you imagine any straight man and any woman going to the hospital and being asked to see the marriage license before being allowed to see the person they stated was their husband or wife?

Yes, this is an important first step the President has taken. But many more steps are still to be walked on the path toward LGBT relationship recognition and equality in America.

That is the title of a news story currently at HRC. It is also now a discouraging reality of our lives.

We previously lived in Oregon where we witnessed that State take three steps forward and two steps back in the relationship recognition battle through the years. Our hopes were raised, our hopes were dashed. Then our hopes were redesigned and redelivered. We were pretty content with the end result in Oregon.

But, as with most of life… don’t get too comfortable! Because the winds of change are going to blow you to a land where people have concluded that you are decidedly a full fledged second class citizen (remember the PA. Senator John Eichelberger who magnanimously stated that PA. is graciously “allowing gays to exist”?) When we moved to Pennsylvania this last summer we suddenly lost any and all relationship recognition and protections that we had in Oregon.

If only something could be done on a National level to help ensure and protect the relationship recognition and rights for same-sex couples! Wait. I believe there is something that could be done! DOMA could be repealed!

In fact, our current President made it a campaign point to say that he supported the repeal of the “Defense of Marriage Act.” On September 15, 09 Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) introduced the Respect Marriage Act in Congress to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act. Time will tell whether President Obama will indeed see this campaign promise brought to fruition while it is within his power to do so.